Viredo Espinosa

Viredo Espinosa was born in 1928 in Regla. It is a small town across the bay from Havana. Regla was an historic port that once served as the shipping backyard of the Spanish Armada. Regla still docked smaller ships and fishing boats. It was a flourishing area incorporated with people of African and Spanish decent. Viredo Espinosa was the eldest of three children. His early childhood was spent in doing swimming, watching the ships come in to the harbor, and tracing the graceful flight of the Pan Am Clippers gliding gently into Havana harbor . Much of Viredo's later art was based on his childhood dealings with this mix of Catholicism, Santeria rites, and Calabar ceremonies. Viredo learned African heritage from these people, including a ninety-year old former slave who told him of the terror of coming from Africa on a slave ship.

Viredo Espinosa's father's barbershop provided him additional knowledge from the boaters, fishermen, and dockworkers who were the main customers. Viredo became curious about the variety of religious ceremonies with their distinct music and color.

At age 14, Espinosa, Viredo started doing artwork for a newspaper owned by a friend of his father. Here he learned lettering, layout, and spot illustrations. At that time he also began to study the work of major comic artists of the time. Next year he started working for the newspaper called Zig Zag, where he added to his skills in commercial art by working with other more experienced artists. At the School of Art and Oficio he learned to make blueprints and architectural renderings.

After a year of these studies, he enrolled San Alejandro Art School , whose curriculum was based on the classic nineteen century academic tradition. Viredo was very uncomfortable with the rigidity and romantic subject matter of his classes, but however he was able to add modification to his own emerging style.

The paintings of Viredo Espinosa were somewhat abstract expressionist with the geometry of cubism; the figures were conventionalized and recognizable. He used texture to soften color planes and to add a sense of motion.

We can mention few names of the famous paintings of Espinosa, Viredo. Such as,